People shouldn't be so beholden that they need someone else to give them sleep.

This can be done indirectly by reducing the work day from 8 hours to 6 hours, those who otherwise need to get up early to commute may have a bit more time to settle down in the evening.

And reducing the productivity of workers by 25% couldn't possibly have any bad effects. /s

In all seriousness, I've seen mentions of studies that suggest going from 8 hours to 6 does _not_ correlate with a 25% decrease in productivity, because most people aren't consistently productive for all 8 hours of a day. I know in my case, there's an extremely strong inverse correlation with productivity and how bored I am with a particular task. I'm sure I'm not alone.

Actually there was an interesting study done to show that most people in the office environment on average do 4 hours of work (actual work) and the rest is breaks, distractions, chit chat, bathroom breaks etc. I have found the 4 hour figure to be much too generous, I’d say on average people work less than 4 hours (maybe closer to 3) the other 5 are a total waste.

When I first started freelancing hourly, it was a sobering feeling to see how little of my time was actually billable for actual work. It takes random screen grabbing software to make you realize that most of the time you are not working. Of course those days have long passed for me but I’m always left to remember just how wasteful office workplaces are and how much time people waste away in their life. More than half of their working life is a total waste. Tell me, how does that make you feel? :)

I'd think so, if you're up against enough people willing to sacrifice sleep/social lives to get a job/project done faster

This assumes raw time spent guarantees faster delivery with comparable quality of work in spite of efficiency implications of low morale and insufficient sleep. I'm sure it does help to a point but I imagine there's an individual threshold where it seizes to be productive.

Most companies (not startups) don't have their employees work much more than 40 hours.

Lack of sleep is very rarely an issue with your employer.

In which fields? Financial/Law firms are routinely scrutinized because they overwork their employees, just to name a few. Doctors, EMS personnel, Police, all work more than 40 hours. There may not be mandated work hours over 40, but the culture/workload creates that environment anyway.

As others have said, sleep deprivation is the norm in certain fields like healthcare. There are also jobs where you work 40 hours but the schedules are so random that they can also screw with your sleep such as retail. And a lot of top performing companies in a variety of fields expect people to always be on.

Even with an 8 hour day plus a long commute, there are at least 14-15 hours a day left for you. If you aren't finding time in there to sleep, that's on you.

Good thing that work is literally my only responsibility as an adult. /s